Staff Blog

I was recently reminded that too much "structure" around children who are deaf-blind may prevent them from growing further in their capabilities. This can sound counter-intuitive because in the field of deaf-blindness we recommend all kinds of strategies that will give "structure" to the student...

The Communication Matrix has been an invaluable tool to assess expressive communication for individuals who are at the earliest stages of communication. It was first published in 1990 and soon it was accessible online, making it an online product that could be accessed from anywhere in the US...

Classrooms provide a poor acoustical environment for many students who have a hearing loss or a combined hearing and vision loss. The three environmental factors that account for a decrease in hearing ability are: 1) Distance – Since sound decreases as distance increases, speech discrimination also...

Myrna Medina and Gloria Rodriguez-Gil:
At California Deaf-Blind Services we are fortunate to have the opportunity to follow students who are deaf-blind from birth to age 21. Throughout our experience, we have observed how transitions in the educational programs are often difficult for parents. This...

This talk highlighted some of the practices that we have been already been thinking about for some time in working with students with deaf-blindness. Here are some of the highlights:
1) Children learning together. In Mr. Mitra’s presentation, we see videos of children teaching each other,...